Backbone
by Tainted Lovers
Summary: A story about how Edward's protective behavior gradually turns possessive. This is how their perfect relationship unravelled. Set in Eclipse, canon pairings. Darkward.


**A/N – I've always been intrigued by the dynamics of Bella and Edward's relationship. I mean, I love them as a couple, but I've always seen their relationship as borderline abusive. I feel like Stephanie Meyer sort of ignored just how much Edward was restraining her.**

**So this is Twilight with a twist!**

**Disclaimer – Everything belongs to S.M. The italics are from Eclipse - it's the scene right after Bella ran off with Jacob for the day, against Edward's wishes.**

_I shut my bedroom door carefully before I turned to face my room._

_Of course he was there. He stood against the wall across from me, in the shadow beside the open window. His face was hard and his posture tense. He glared at me wordlessly._

_I cringed, waiting for the torrent, but it didn't come. He just continued to glare, possibly too angry to speak._

_"Hi," I finally said._

_His face could have been carved from stone. I counted to one hundred in my head, but there was no change._

_"Er . . . so, I'm still alive," I began._

_A growl rumbled low in his chest, but his expression didn't change._

_"No harm done," I insisted with a shrug._

_He moved. His eyes closed, and he pinched the bridge of his nose between the fingers of his right hand._

_"Bella," he whispered. "Do you have any idea how close I came to crossing the line today? To breaking the treaty and coming after you? Do you know what that would have meant?"_

_I gasped and his eyes opened. They were as cold and hard as night._

_"You can't!" I said too loudly. I worked to modulate the volume of my voice so Charlie wouldn't hear, but I wanted to shout the words. "Edward, they'd use any excuse for a fight. They'd love that. You can't ever break the rules!"_

_"Maybe they aren't the only ones who would enjoy a fight."_

_"Don't you start," I snapped. "You made the treaty - you stick to it."_

_"If he'd hurt you -"_

_"Enough!" I cut him off. _I took a deep breath, and crossed the room. He didn't move when I wrapped my arms around him. His skin felt especially icy in that moment. He seemed like ice, too, frozen the way he was. _He sighed, and relaxed a little. His arms wound around my waist.__ _

_"I know I don't have to worry about Jake. And neither do you."_

His hands formed into fists again. I could feel them against my back. "You aren't going to see him again, Bella." The black fire in his eyes made it impossible to doubt how serious he was.

"Wait are you…what, forbidding me?" I scoffed at the ridiculousness of the situation.

"If you choose to look at it that way." He said, cooly. His face was hard and blank, wiped of any emotion.

I looked at him for a long second. I could feel my emotions beginning to take the better of me. I was surprised by the finality of my tone when I finally spoke. "I don't need your permission to see my friends. I'm sorry I went behind your back, but if you would just stop being so-"

He suddenly unwound his arms from around my back to grasp my face in his hands with a little too much force. "You will not see him again. End of story."

I hesitated on what to do next. For a long time it was just him, holding my face in his hands, staring down at me while I stared at a spot somewhere on his chest, unable to meet his hard stare.

After a while I closed my eyes tightly and attempted to move my head to the side, out of his grip. He let go when he saw what I was trying to do and dropped his arms to his sides.

_How did we get like this?_

I couldn't pinpoint exactly where we went wrong. We did everything by the book – we communicated about everything, just the way couples are supposed to. We tell each other how much we love each other almost too often. We spend more than enough time together. Isn't that the definition of the perfect relationship?

"I. Don't. Need. Your. _Permission_." I hissed, being sure to annunciate each word. I risked a look at his face, and I could swear my heart stopped.

His entire face tightened – his jaw was set and his eyes took on this dangerous, metallic glint. I almost wished I could take it back because in the entire time I've known Edward, I was never once truly afraid of him. Not when he warned me of the monster that he was, not when he explained to me how appetizing I smelled. I had always known he would never hurt me. But he had never looked like this before, and for the first time, I was afraid of him.

I was terrified.

"Don't you?" He cocked an eyebrow. He bent down until his eyes were at the same level as mine and our noses almost touching. I felt hypnotized and couldn't tear my terrified gaze away from his dangerous stare.

After an uncomfortably long amount of time I found the courage to look down, and his hand immediately shot out at an inhuman pace to grab my chin and yank it back into place. It wasn't quite enough force to hurt me, but enough to startle me into looking back into his eyes.

"Don't go down this road." He said softly. His breath fanned across my face and a shiver ran down my spine as I processed the warning.

And then I knew where we went wrong. Suddenly I saw every mistake that we'd made, both of us. The way I never told him no when he ordered me around. The way I stubbornly ignored him when he asked instead of demanded. The times he had taken my will and choices away. The way I talked and he never listened to my opinion when he thought the matter was above me. The times he used his physical strength to restrain me, or his and Alice's power to control my fate. The times I held back my trust in him after he left me for so long. We were nothing close to a healthy relationship.

"Get some sleep. Clear your head. Maybe tomorrow you'll be more sensible." He let go of my chin with a little too much force, obviously still angry with me. I wished, in that moment, that I could scream at him. I wished I had enough strength to slap him. I wished I could scream for Charlie and that he had enough strength to chase Edward out of the house.

But wishing only gets you so far.

I focused on blinking away the tears that were beginning to surface as I watched Edward's face soften – I could have sworn their were traces of guilt in his expression, but it was so controlled that I couldn't be sure – and his hand find its way to the small of my back as he walked me over to my bed. He unfolded the blankets and helped me in, and I let him. I faced away from him and closed my eyes tightly, trying to feel safe.

But I felt the other side of the bed move, and then a cold arm wrapped itself around my torso. Edward pulled back on my body, into his chest, and molded it to his. I didn't fight it. I was just so _tired. _He leaned over to softly kiss my temple.

"Goodnight, Bella."

I wished, in that moment, that I could feel safe in my home, in my own bed.

But wishing only gets you so far.

**A/N – Let me know if it's worth continuing! The actual 'backbone' part would obviously appear in future chapters (:**


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